Why I bbq'd my headlight

So the inside of my wagons headlights have seen better days. There's some kind of strange buildup in there. And a dead moth who has been there for quite a while now.

So having some spare time over the weekend it was time to open things up and have a good poke/scrub around.

Getting it out was fun. There's a few nuts, wires and another light assembly holding it in place. Oh and a couple of nuts behind the grill so that has to come out. Thankfully the front bar can stay on otherwise I would have given up on this idea ages ago.

Now that it was out, the lens plastic had to come off for best access inside. I tried to cut through the factory sealant with a pen knife, only to have the blade snap. Okay onto another way. I read you can bake them in the oven but since I was working outside and there's a perfectly good bbq not doing much out here..

...into the bbq it went!

First though, I took out all the screws and metal bits as possible as these will retain heat much longer than anything else. Then I lit HALF the burners at low heat and set the light assembly on the other side. So no, it never sat on a heated up hotplate. With the hood down it quickly reached 125 degrees Celcius and ten minutes later it was time for some gloves:

A flat head screwdriver to act as a prying tool

And a bit of strength and slow prying action, away comes the lens.

Sadly though whatever this black stuff is, it's been there for a very long time and no amount of scraping, chipping, sanding or yelling at it got it off. Still at least I could clean the inside of things for the first time in about 1000 years.

Once cleaned up both parts went back into the bbq for ten minutes for the sealant to heat up again and then the lens was carefully pressed back into place and allowed to cool. Then it was bolted back in the car and tested to make sure I plugged everything back in correctly.

So while it didn't get rid of the buildup problem, I did learn how to safely take apart a headlight today. And now my car is 100% moth free which is always a good thing..